USA Dot Com is a blog covering politics and government from a conservative Christian perspective. Verne Strickland is a 50-year veteran of investigative journalism. This blog offers a take-no-prisoners style with a modicum of biting satire. Verne and his wife of 55 years, Durrene, live in Wilmington, NC.

Wednesday, February 1, 2012

PANTANO CAN HELP FILL NEED IN U.S. CONGRESS FOR LAWMAKERS WITH MILITARY COMBAT EXPERIENCE.

Wednesday, February 1, 2012

By Verne Strickland / February 2, 2012

Mike McIntyre may run for governor. He may try to become even more
excessively incumbent in the U.S. Congress. He may decide to return to
Lumberton and become a peanut farmer. But it's most likely that his ego
and love for the high-life will keep him close to the action.

This feature on his most probable direction from this point should be
interesting and instructive. No matter which way Mr. McIntyre dodges,
NC/7 GOP candidate Ilario Pantano and his dedicated cadre of volunteers
and supporters may have the final say on this -- and send him back to
the farm.

***********

First published Thursday, August 19, 2010

Most members of the U.S. Congress don’t have a clue how battles and wars are fought. They haven’t been there.

The
disconnect shows in muddled decision-making, callous calls on Rules of
Engagement, dangerous and naive micromanagment, and — perhaps most vital
of all — failure to offer up a prescription on how to win, decisively
and honorably.

As a result, America — still the most powerful
nation on earth, and the most magnanimous – limps through combat
situations with its fighting forces hobbled by naive directives from
U.S. Congressmen who project a sanitized mentality of life — and death —
in the savagery of desperate combat.

In Iraq and Afghanistan,
the enemy wears no uniform, squanders its own “soldiers” behind the
cowardice of suicide missions, human shields, and wantonly kills
innocents at every opportunity to weaken the resolve of the “government”
to resist.

Who could understand this war? Who could deal with
it? Lawyers? I don’t think so. But these are the ladies and gentlemen
who send our fighting forces into combat, then waste their potential,
and safety, by imposing military impotence.

According to the Congressional Research Service 170 members of the House and 58 Senators have law degrees.

Is that enough? Or way too many? The troops who fight for our freedom are having their say now about this issue.

The
choice is crystal clear in the Seventh Congressional District of North
Carolina, where seven-term incumbent Mike McIntyre, an attorney who has
never been in uniform, is being challenged by former combat-seasoned
Marine officer Ilario Pantano.

The crying need in Washington for
American patriots who have fought our wars, and who are doing so now, is
powerfully expressed in a statement by Kieran Michael Lalor, founder of
Iraq Veterans for Congress. These are excerpts of his comments:

White
Plains, NY – August 17, 2010: The number of veterans in Congress has
been dwindling since the end of the Cold War. In 1980 more than sixty
percent of Congress had served but now barely twenty percent of our
leaders in Washington DC spent time in uniform.

The number of
combat veterans is even smaller. According to a report by the House
Armed Services Committee only five percent of House members served in
combat zones and even fewer saw actual combat.

Also quite rare is
the member of Congress who served as an enlisted man. Only about forty
percent of the veterans in Congress were enlisted despite the fact that
eighty-five percent of our military are enlisted rather than
commissioned officers.

In short, those who actually fight our
wars are severely underrepresented in Congress. For a variety of
reasons, it is in the national interest to have in Congress a critical
mass of enlisted men with trigger time.

While colonels and
generals craft the overall strategy of any conflict, the execution is
done primarily by privates, corporals and sergeants of the infantry,
artillery and cavalry. Because they operate where the metal hits the
meat, enlisted men of the combat arms have valuable insights into
equipment, tactics and policies.

The debate over the Rules of
Engagement in Afghanistan highlights the desperate need for enlisted
combat veterans of the War on Terror in Congress. Someone with a
worm’s-eye view of the impact restrictive rules have on morale and a
small unit’s ability to accomplish the mission would be invaluable when
questioning the Pentagon brass about the wisdom of current and future
rules.

Voters in North Carolina need look no further
than Wilmington, NC, for a shining example of a patriotic young
American who enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps at 17, fought in the
First Gulf War as an anti-tank gunner, re-enlisted after 9/11, won his
commission at OCS, was deployed to Iraq where he took command of a
Infantry Platoon and led them in combat in the “Triangle of Death”
Region of Iraq, engaging the enemy in Latayifah, Yusufiyah and Falluja.

That
former Marine, Ilario Pantano, was praised today (August 19) by retired
Major General James E. Livingston, recipient of the highest military
decoration bestowed by the United States – the Medal of Honor — for
heroic actions in 1968 during the Vietnam War.

Livingston served
on active duty in the Marine Corps over 33 years before retiring on
September 1, 1995. He visited Wilmington, NC, Pantano’s hometown, to
support the GOP nominee at a campaign news conference.

“Ilario is
a true leader, a man of honor and integrity,” said General Livingston.
“As a Marine who led men into battle in Vietnam, I understand the
challenge of combat leadership, forged in the toughest crucible known to
man.

“Ilario has once again decided to heed the call to service,
this time to serve as a Congressman to stand up for us in Washington,
to return fiscal responsibility to our government, to protect our
national security, and preserve our values,” said General Livingston.

He
particularly praised Pantano for pledging to limit his service in the
U.S. House of Representatives to six terms, or a total of 12 years.

Pantano
secured his pledge with a $250,000 personal bond, which will be
forfeited to “Step Up for Soldiers”, a 501(c)3 charitable organization,
should he fail to honor his commitment.

Meanwhile, Mike McIntyre,
seven-term Seventh Congressional District incumbent, a Democrat, is
ignoring his own pledge to cap his service at 12 years — a promise he
made when first elected in 1996.

“He wasn’t supposed to run for
re-election again in 2008. He did it anyway. And, worse than breaking
his word, he’s reversed himself and voted sgainst term limits for
committee chairmen, thus ensuring a cycle of corruption amongst his
peers. Now he’s running again in 2010,” observed GOP candidate Pantano.

Perhaps
voters in the conservative Seventh NC District, turned off by
McIntyre’s claim of conservatism while voting repeatedly with liberal
House Speaker Pelosi, will make the decision for the congressman, to
spare him the anguish of retiring voluntarily.